Summary:
Most people searching for moving and storage services in Nassau County aren’t looking for a lecture — they’re trying to figure out what they’re actually paying for. What’s included in “full service”? Is storage a separate company? Can they handle a piano? What happens if the quote changes on moving day?
These are reasonable questions, and the moving industry doesn’t always answer them clearly. So let’s fix that. Here’s an honest breakdown of what moving and storage services actually cover, what the common gaps are, and what to look for when you’re hiring someone to handle your home.
Movers with Storage: One Company or Two?
Here’s something most people don’t realize until it’s too late: when a moving company says they offer storage, they often mean they’ll hand your belongings off to a third-party storage facility — one you’ve never dealt with, under a separate contract, with a separate point of contact if something goes wrong.
True bundled moving and storage — where the same company loads your truck, transports your items, and stores them in our own climate-controlled facility — is less common than the search results suggest. For Nassau County residents navigating tight closing timelines, lease gaps, or renovations, that distinction matters a lot. One company means one call, one team, and one place to go if anything needs to be sorted out.
At Dunbar Moving, we handle both the transport and storage sides of your move in-house. That means you’re not juggling two contracts or waiting on hold with a third party when you need an answer about your belongings.
What Moving Help Is Actually Included in Full Service
“Full service” is one of the most misused phrases in the moving industry. It sounds like it covers everything, but what’s actually included varies significantly from one company to the next — and the gaps tend to show up at the worst possible time.
At its core, full-service moving covers loading, transporting, and unloading your belongings. Our crews bring the truck, the blankets, the shrink wrap, and the equipment. We handle the heavy lifting, protect your walls and doorways through tight spaces, and get everything from point A to point B without you having to rent a truck or recruit your neighbors.
Packing, however, is frequently not included by default. Many people assume their movers will pack their kitchen and bedroom — then find out on moving day that packing is a separate line item. If you want boxes packed, labeled, and organized by room, you need to ask for that explicitly and confirm it’s part of your quote.
Specialty items are another area where assumptions get people into trouble. A standard moving crew may not be equipped — or willing — to move a piano, a safe, antiques, or large appliances. These items require specific equipment, proper manpower, and experience. If you have any of them, that conversation needs to happen before you book, not the morning of your move.
Storage is the third area where the “full service” label gets fuzzy. Some companies include short-term storage in their package; others treat it as a completely separate service with its own pricing, contract, and facility. If you need storage as part of your move — even temporarily — confirm whether it’s handled in-house or outsourced.
The short version: ask your mover exactly what’s included in writing, and don’t assume packing, specialty items, or storage are covered just because the company offers them.
Flat Rate Movers vs. Hourly: What the Difference Costs You
How a moving company charges you matters as much as how much they charge. There are two main pricing structures you’ll encounter: hourly rates and flat-rate (or binding) estimates.
Hourly pricing is straightforward in theory — you pay for the time the crew spends on your move. In practice, it creates uncertainty. Traffic on the Long Island Expressway, a slow elevator in a Garden City co-op, or an unexpected disassembly job can all add hours you didn’t budget for. Local full-service moving typically starts around $135 per hour for a two-mover crew with a truck, with most companies requiring a minimum of three hours plus a travel hour — so even a “small” move has a floor.
Flat-rate estimates, sometimes called binding or binding-not-to-exceed quotes, lock in a price based on your inventory and the scope of the job. You know what you’re paying before the truck pulls up. This is the model that tends to generate the most trust in customer reviews — and for good reason. The moving industry has a well-documented problem with non-binding quotes that look attractive upfront and escalate significantly by the time your belongings are loaded. Research from consumer protection organizations shows that binding and non-binding quotes from the same carrier can vary by 18 to 30 percent.
When you’re comparing quotes, the number on the page isn’t the whole story. Ask whether it’s binding, what triggers additional charges, and whether the estimate was based on an actual inventory review or a phone conversation. Pro movers who take the time to understand your move before quoting are almost always the safer bet — even when their initial number is slightly higher.
Piano Movers: Why This Is a Completely Different Job
If you have a piano, you already know it’s not going to move itself. What you might not know is how different piano moving is from standard furniture moving — and why handing it off to a general crew without the right experience is one of the more common ways people end up with a damaged instrument and a damaged wall.
A standard upright piano weighs between 400 and 800 pounds. A baby grand can weigh 500 to 1,000 pounds, and a concert grand may require up to five professionals working in coordination. These aren’t items you strap to a dolly and roll out the front door. Piano transport involves specialized equipment, proper padding and wrapping, and in many cases, partial disassembly — particularly for grand pianos, which often need the legs removed before they can be safely moved.
We’ve moved pianos throughout Nassau County for decades, and we know the specific challenges that come with older homes in Great Neck, Manhasset, and Mineola — narrow staircases, tight doorways, and century-old floors that need protection. That experience matters.
Piano mover rates depend on the type of piano, the distance it’s traveling, and the physical conditions of the move — particularly whether stairs are involved. For local moves in Nassau County, moving an upright piano typically runs between $100 and $350. Grand piano moving cost tends to fall in the $250 to $650 range for local jobs. The average across all piano types lands around $426, with most moves falling somewhere between $262 and $597.
Those numbers assume a relatively straightforward move — ground floor to ground floor, no tight turns, no staircases. Moving a piano upstairs or moving a piano down stairs adds to the cost. Stair fees are typically calculated per step ($5 to $10 per step) or per flight ($40 to $100 per staircase), depending on the company.
If you’re moving into a two-story Cape Cod in Hicksville or a brownstone-style walkup in Long Beach, that’s a real number to factor into your piano moving estimate. For grand pianos specifically, the job may also require crating for transport or storage, which adds to the overall cost.
The best way to get an accurate figure is to have the mover assess the piano in person — its size, its location in your current home, and where it’s going. A phone estimate for a grand piano is almost never accurate enough to rely on.
Junk Piano Removal: When You're Not Taking It with You
Not everyone wants to take their piano with them. If you’re downsizing from a large Nassau County home into a condo or assisted living, junk piano removal is a legitimate service — the piano gets removed and disposed of rather than transported. Piano removal cost for this type of job typically runs between $50 and $350 depending on size and accessibility.
Piano Moving and Storage: When the Piano Needs to Wait
Renovations, timing gaps between closings, and staged home sales are all situations where transporting a piano to its final destination isn’t immediately possible. In those cases, piano moving and storage go hand in hand — and where you store a piano matters.
Pianos are sensitive to temperature and humidity changes. A standard self-storage unit on the side of a highway is not an appropriate environment for a piano, particularly on Long Island, where summer humidity regularly climbs and winter temperatures swing. Climate-controlled storage maintains consistent conditions year-round, which protects the soundboard, the finish, and the internal mechanics from the kind of damage that develops slowly and costs significantly to repair.
The best way to move piano — whether to a new home or into temporary storage — is with a company that handles both sides of the job. When the same crew that wraps and loads the piano also controls where it goes and how it’s stored, there’s no handoff, no gap in accountability, and no moment where your instrument is sitting in a facility that doesn’t know what it is or how to handle it.
For Nassau County homeowners dealing with estate situations, this combination is especially relevant. Downsizing from a large home in Oyster Bay or Garden City often means sorting through decades of belongings, deciding what moves, what gets donated, what gets stored, and what gets removed. Having a company that can handle moving, storage, cleanouts, and junk removal — including piano removal — from a single call is genuinely useful, not just a marketing line.
